Gimble not moving or responding

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Greetings fellow droners! I'm very new to this but I have a problem that needs solving.

I've had a P3 drone for about 3 years and it's been working great. Recently a warning popped up saying GIMBLE MOTOR OVERLOAD, I did a quick google and found several videos telling you how to fix this. It took about a month but I finally managed to get this warning fixed. Only recently when I went to get an overhead picture of my area, I noticed that I couldn't get the gimble to move up and down. I tried HEAPS of YouTube videos but I couldn't get it to work. For the three years I've had it only once have I landed it a bit hard, but when I did I took it home and thoroughly checked it for any cracked parts or ripped cables but everything looked A-OK. I'm guilty to say that I have flown the drone in some dust areas so some dust particles may have wedged their way in somewhere. I've tried hundreds of times to get over it but I love taking photos and videos with this drone. I'm half thinking of just getting it repaired at a drone shop but I don't want to spend a lot of money. Anyone have advice?

High five, thumbs up, or whatever the young people are doing these days
 
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Ah, sorry I forgot to mention that I have tried to do the gimble auto calibration but it doesn't move or calibrate. I looked at the warnings but nothing has come up, IMU calibration doesn't show up and compass calibration doesn't get the gimbal to work. I know it's going to be useless but I'm gonna try some YouTube videos now and hope that someone found a quick solution to this problem.
 
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Welcome hey we all young here lol
Ok which p3 do you have ? Just so we know,p3s,p34k,p3p,p3a,?
You say gimble calibration not work,,does cam have a colour light showing on gimble mount,,red , green or nothing,,sin e not used for while do a stick calibration under rc settings to corect or reset stick and gimble wheel operation,,,,,no imu sounds bit odd,are you saying its greyed out or wont click on or wont perform imu check........the more info you can give to us here the better we will have idea of what's going on,even a small clip of what it does when powers up,,,when it's on can you feel any resistance when try move cam or it limp
Screenshot_20200916-185623_Chrome.jpg
 
Okey dokey, I have a Phantom 3 Standard, Yes there is a light on the gimble mount, the color is uhmm green I think and slowly flashing (I'm a tad color blind, my apologies) if not green then red but pretty sure its green. I shall do a stick calibration tomorrow and tell you how it goes, ummm so I tried to calibrate the gimble, it says GIMBLE CALIBRATING but it just doesn't do anything, when I turn the drone on it does the usual beep beep beep beep noise, but the gimble doesn't move or make the noise it would normally make. If I touch it and move it around it has a little bit of life but it doesn't work for long and will just hang limp. The drone itself works fine, I can fly it and see whats streaming on the gimble but I cant control it using the scroll on the remote or on the phone. I'll take a short video tomorrow on what it does when i turn it on.

Thanks peoples!
:)
 
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Okey dokey, I have a Phantom 3 Standard, Yes there is a light on the gimble mount, the color is uhmm green I think and slowly flashing (I'm a tad color blind, my apologies) if not green then red but pretty sure its green. I shall do a stick calibration tomorrow and tell you how it goes, ummm so I tried to calibrate the gimble, it says GIMBLE CALIBRATING but it just doesn't do anything, when I turn the drone on it does the usual beep beep beep beep noise, but the gimble doesn't move or make the noise it would normally make. If I touch it and move it around it has a little bit of life but it doesn't work for long and will just hang limp. The drone itself works fine, I can fly it and see whats streaming on the gimble but I cant control it using the scroll on the remote or on the phone. I'll take a short video tomorrow on what it does when i turn it on.

Keep On Keepin' On!
Thanks guys!
:)
Check the black flat cable on the camera assembly to make sure the connections are good.
 
Alright, I've tried a remote controller stick alignment and uhmm it didn't work... Something must be wrong with the controller or the app because it says that my left stick is on full throttle up and err... it isn't. I centred all the sticks to the middle, the camera scroll is always in the middle, and I pushed the S1 and S2 switches to the centre... I have no clue what is happening... I have checked the black flat cable on the camera all looks good, nothing looks damaged or ripped. Right about the video I'm err... very new to this so I'm not sure how to upload a video so I'll just describe what happens when I turn on the drone. Right so when I turn on the drone it does the usual beep, beep, beep, beep. The drone itself looks totally fine and works great when I fly it but the camera just hangs limp, if I touch the camera it will move in the direction I push it and there is no resistance. everything on the gimble looks great and nothing at all looks wrong but it’s just the camera that just doesn't want to move, like I said everything looks fine and nothing looks damaged and you can even see through the camera but it just doesn't move up and down.


Don't worry if all of this doesn't make sense to you... It doesn't make sense to me

Thanks guys!
 
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Alright, I've tried a remote controller stick alignment and uhmm it didn't work... Something must be wrong with the controller or the app because it says that my left stick is on full throttle up and err... it isn't. I centred all the sticks to the middle, the camera scroll is always in the middle, and I pushed the S1 and S2 switches to the centre... I am VERY confused... I have checked the black flat cable on the camera all looks good, nothing looks damaged or ripped. I'm err... very new to this so I'm not sure how to upload a video so I'll just describe what happens when I turn on the drone, right so when I turn on the drone it does the usual beep, beep, beep, beep. The drone itself looks totally fine and works great when I fly it but the camera just hangs limp, if I touch the camera it will move in the direction I push it and there is no resistance. everything on the gimble looks great and nothing at all looks wrong but it’s just the camera that just doesn't want to move, like I said everything looks fine and nothing looks damaged and you can even see through the camera but it just doesn't move up and down.


hope that’s enough information!

Thanks guys!
Well it may need to be repaired,, bad motors on the gimbal or maybe a roll motor board and/or pitch motor, pitch board. Has the drone been started up with a gimbal lock still in place?
 
No, the drone has never been on with the gimble lock on, and of course I removed the little foam piece at the back of the gimble. Hmmm, I was afraid that someone would would say I might have to get it repaired. So how much would roll motor and/or pitch motor, pitch board cost??? Oh and where to get it repaired? I'm in Darwin at the moment and according to my google searches, there aren't any drone repairs in the NT. Now I'm kinda wondering if I should just buy a new gimble and replace the old one will doing that cost more money that just getting it repaired? Oh and I was just thinking that possibly some cables or cords got boiled in Darwin's 40 degree heat. Does the heat do any damage to the drone???
 
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You may want to try the DJI Forum. There are numerous threads there that discuss drone repairs in Australia. Do a search and see what comes up. Good luck.

Link below [emoji652]️
 
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Hello Everyone!

I just wanted to thank you very much for all of the help you have given me, I've sent an email to someone who will repair my drone for me so soon everything will hopefully be fixed! Thank you all again for your help!
:) :) :)
 
I have just started having this same problem on my P3S. It just appeared out of the blue. Sometimes it starts up ok but it seems to be starting more frequently with the limp gimbal (still have video feed). I find if I gently wiggle my P3S the gimbal comes back to life.

I’d be interested in finding out what the cause is when you get your P3S repaired.

Chris
 
I have just started having this same problem on my P3S. It just appeared out of the blue. Sometimes it starts up ok but it seems to be starting more frequently with the limp gimbal (still have video feed). I find if I gently wiggle my P3S the gimbal comes back to life.

I’d be interested in finding out what the cause is when you get your P3S repaired.

Chris

Many, many years ago I had a similar issue with my P3S. Upon the advice of the experts here on the forum, they suggested replacing the ribbon cable. So I did.

That solved the problem. Haven't had that issue since.

If you do plan on changing out that cable, be sure it is Genuine DJI OEM Part #85. There are hundreds of copycat products out there that usually don't work. It is too much of a pain in the a$$ to do it a second time due to a faulty cable.

There are also dozens of YouTube videos out there on how to swap out that cable if you need a little help.
 
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Okay, thanks for the tip!
Hopefully the people repairing my drone will fix it alright, but if the problem persists I will consult YouTub* and make sure I replace the cable with the right one

Thanks again!
:)
 
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@captainmilehigh, thanks for your reply and suggestions. I think I will go ahead and purchase a new cable (an OEM one) to have on hand when the original finally fails. Did one flight with my P3S today and it did the limp thing again. I gently shook the AC and the gimbal initialized but was doing a little horizontal jerk so I restarted and everything was fine. I did notice during the flight that it very briefly wobbled a bit. I think whatever is failing, hopefully just the ribbon cable, is gradually getting worse and will eventually fail for good. When that happens I will try to replace it with the one I purchase. No use doing it now as it is still working with a little help.

Chris
 
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Yes sir. Just be sure it is a genuine DJI part #85. With multiple clip-in contact point plugs, and micro-thin wire, you will only want to do the swap once.

YouTube videos will prepare you for the adventure. You might want to double check the snug-ness of the old plugins. The ones you can easily get to anyway. Maybe the current issue is just a loose connection. Good luck...[emoji106]
 
@captainmilehigh, thanks for your reply and suggestions. I think I will go ahead and purchase a new cable (an OEM one) to have on hand when the original finally fails. Did one flight with my P3S today and it did the limp thing again. I gently shook the AC and the gimbal initialized but was doing a little horizontal jerk so I restarted and everything was fine. I did notice during the flight that it very briefly wobbled a bit. I think whatever is failing, hopefully just the ribbon cable, is gradually getting worse and will eventually fail for good. When that happens I will try to replace it with the one I purchase. No use doing it now as it is still working with a little help.

Chris

Yes, I would definitely make sure that there aren't any problems that you can fix yourself, you don't want to send it to someone who's just going to do something that you could easily do yourself.
 

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